September 2005 Archives

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The Hammer Comes Down

September 29, 2005 01:08 PM

I think John Dickinson, in Slate, has this about right. Several years ago I asked a high-ranking House Republican why the party was providing only meager resources to the GOP candidates challenging Rep. Cynthia McKinney of Georgia and then-Rep. Earl Hilliard of Alabama. At the time both were contending that their opponents were stalking horses for a powerful and well-organized Jewish cabal in Washington -- yes, kind of like the one that later forced President Bush to invade Iraq in order to protect Israel and blah blah blah. Since I figured that nutters make good targets for the opposition, I wondered why the Republicans had made no effort to unseat them. The GOP lawmaker explained, basically, that Hilliard and McKinney were less useful to the party on the outside than they were on the inside. Along with a few other culprits, McKinney and Hilliard were enabling the GOP to make its first serious inroads in the Jewish community, the lawmaker pointed out. I expect the Democrats will hate to lose Tom DeLay (though, of course, he'll be cryogenically preserved in the party's direct-mail appeals to contributors).

But here's something to watch.... Some will recall that a few years ago the House Democrats, through their campaign committee, filed a civil RICO suit against DeLay, alleging illegal coordination with various political entities. They eventually withdrew the suit. Here's the thing, though: As any Democrat involved in that affair will tell you -- if he is being honest -- DeLay wasn't the real target of the suit. The actual target was the so-called donor community -- the people who give the big money in Washington and across the country. DeLay had cultivated (if that's the word) this community -- comprised mostly of corporate representatives and lobbyists -- to the point where many in the donor comunity felt obligated to support to GOP and its key candidates (and at the same time shun the Democrats). The Democrats reckoned that a civil suit against DeLay -- or, more precisely, the discovery phase of that suit -- would spook this community of givers. As with anything that might rile shareholders, Corporate America would naturally be concerned by the prospect of being dragged into a court proceeding that might reveal vulnerabilities to competitors, and perhaps even some unsavory activity in the political sphere. I assume DeLay is now radioactive to these givers, for the reasons given above. But if that's the case, Republicans would likely lose millions of dollars DeLay would otherwise raise for their campaigns. And that -- his ability discipline contributors -- is the real source of his power. So what happens if and when the money dries up? If House Republicans stick with him then, we'll know he's holding their children hostage somewhere.

Link · American Politics

Orange and Black and Blue

September 23, 2005 08:05 AM

CATCHING UP: Ukrainian president Viktor Yushchenko moved today to eliminate several key government posts -- and reduce the power of others -- as part of a bargain made Sept. 22 with the Regions political party. The deal enabled Yushchenko to secure the votes he needed to get his choice for prime minister, Yuri Yekhanurov, through the Rada, which had rejected Yekhanurov earlier in the week. And while the parliament's ratification of Yushchenko's choice is a hopeful sign, there may be ominous portents embedded in arrangement that enabled this to occur. The key to Yekhanurov's approval turned out to be Viktor Yanukovich, Yushchenko's bitter rival in last year's presidential contest and the leader of the Regions bloc in parliament. On its surface, the agreement with Yanukovich, which brought more than 50 votes to Yekhanurov, was about "access" to the president. In eliminating some key positions, including that of "chief aide" to the president, Yushchenko bowed to demands that he streamline the top level of his executive organization, which had been accused of blocking access to him. Yushchenko also moved to reduce the power of the state security chief, the post headed by his departed ally Petro Poroshenko. After his election Yushchenko had vested this position with significant new powers in order to provide a balance of power among his top ministers. But this swiftly turned into a disaster, as Poroshenko, who had wanted to be prime minister, bickered endlessly with Yushchenko's appointee, Yulia Tymoshenko. The problem with this is that Yanukovich is, to put it mildly, a thug and a crook -- in short, everything the Orange Revolution was supposed to be rebelling against in Ukrainian politics. There had already been quite a sensation stirred earlier in the week when Yekhanurov was photographed in a friendly embrace with former president Leonid Kuchma, who to some degree personifies the corruption that existed before the revolution. The question now is whether Yushchenko, in bringing these former enemies to the table, risks alienating the reformist base that lifted him to power.

Meanwhile Tymoshenko, who was dismissed along with the rest of the ministers on Sept. 8, reached out to Yushchenko on Wednesday, offering to help form a new alliance for the sake of unity. (This was before the second vote on Yekhanurov.) But rather than view this as a moment of magnanimity, political analysts here seem to have interpreted this gesture by Tymoshenko as the opening move in a struggle for power that will last at least until the parliamentary elections in March. The reasoning here is that Tymoshenko knew her overture would be rejected, and wants to be able to portray Yushchenko as unwilling to seek unity for the sake of Ukraine. Yushchenko, for his part, really had no choice but to brush aside Tymoshenko's offer. In an interview with foreign press last week he charged that the former PM had operated corruptly during her tenure. (Among the allegations was that she sought to leverage her position for "control" of a major Ukrainian television station -- which, alas, is typical politics in the former Soviet Bloc. Meanwhile, the state's inspector general cleared two former Yushchenko aides, Oleksandr Tretyakov and Mykola Martinenko, of corruption charges. Alexandr Zinchenko, Yushchenko's former chief of staff, had accused the two figures -- along with Poroshenko -- of corruption in announcing his resignation earlier this month. The resignation touched off the chain of events that ultimately brought down the government. Yushchenko has stated publicly that there is no real evidence of corruption around Poroshenko, the godfather to one of Yushchenko's children.

One more matter bears mentioning. Amid the soap opera of Ukrainian politics, Yushchenko has indicated that he will seek to delay constitutional reforms set to take effect in January. The reforms are intended devolve some of the president's powers to the prime minister and the parliament. Probably most important among these is the power to choose the prime minister, which after January will fall to the parliament. In suggesting a delay in the constitutional reforms, Yushchenko is moving into dangerous territory. Major groups in parliament, including the Communists, the Socialists and the Social Democrats, strongly back the changes. And it is not even clear Yushchenko has a suitable pretext -- let alone the authority -- to stop their implementation. Yet the alternative is politically treacherous for him. The March parliamentary elections could very well provide a Tymoshenko-led bloc with the votes needed to re-appoint her as prime minister -- this time with power to rival Yushchenko's. This could be disastrous, and not simply from the standpoint of intangibles like "stability." Any governing coalition that must rely on the communists and the socialists for foundational support would simply not be in a position to adopt the reforms necessary to for Ukraine to be assimilated into Europe or any number of other international organizations, including the WTO. And Ukraine desperately needs these alliances to build its battered economy.

Link · Ukraine

Globa Phenomenon?

September 22, 2005 11:02 AM

A couple of Ukrainian friends have pointed me to one possible "root cause" of the country's current political turmoil. His name is Pavel Globa, a very popular astrologer who is "Rector" of the Moscow Institute of Astrology. He is well-known for having predicted the August 1998 Russian political crisis, and, among other things, maintains that there has traditionally been a connection between the Chinese Year of the Snake and worldwide political and social upheaval. In January of 2001, the last Year of the Snake, Globa had this to say in a Q&A with the St. Petersburg (Russia) Times:

Also, revolutionary situations will escalate abroad, especially in Islamic countries....[snip]

Prescient, no? He also predicted that the Age of Aquarius, beginning in 2003, threatens earth "and our lives as well." (That's right -- both.) Anyhow, according to my Ukrainian pals, Globa predicted a few years ago that Ukraine would soon enter a period of pronounced economic growth and vitality. It would coincide with the election of a woman as president; the woman would be a relatively unknown figure on the political scene (at the time of the prediction), but she will rise swiftly through the ranks to become the country's leader, marking the onset of this wonderful new era. And, wouldn't you know it, along came Yulia Tymoshenko, the beautiful tycoon populist with the peasant hairstyle who rose to national prominence (and then prime minister) through the Orange Revolution. So, explained my friends, if you are astrologically inclined, Viktor Yushchenko looks less like a president trying to bring stability and reform to a nascent democracy, and more like a living obstacle to Ukraine's glorious future. And in this way of seeing things, Yushchenko has become actively meddlesome as well, since he dismissed Tymoshenko from the government and accused her of seeking personal benefit from the government's re-privatization efforts.

Of course, he would say this, no? It's written in the stars....

Link · Ukraine

The Gas Princess and the Chocolate King

September 9, 2005 08:15 AM

The dizzying speed of developments here in Kiev has made it difficult to provide useful analysis in the last week. But no longer. Yesterday's announcement by ousted PM Yulia Tymoshenko that she is casting her lot with the opposition virtually ends any hope that president Viktor Yushchenko will be able to impose a meaningful degree of political and economic "stability" -- at least until crucial parliamentary elections are held in March. Tymoshenko's move to the opposition was, of course, always one possible outcome of the president's decision to dismiss the government Thursday morning. Yet Yushchenko clearly believed he had been left no choice after failing to reach accommodation with Tymoshenko in 11th-hour talks. In fact, Tymoshenko's departure ratchets up the stakes in the March elections even further. Ukraine is set to adopt constitutional reforms in January that will devolve some of the presidency's extraordinary powers to parliament. It is yet unclear how the events of the past week will impact that process, but this is a matter of great speculation and concern around the capital and around the diplomatic community. In the meantime, the possibility that Ukraine will adopt economic reforms needed for accession to the World Trade Organization before the elections is now approximately nil. This is in itself important, because it provides an opportunity now for Russia to enter the W.T.O. ahead of Ukraine, providing the Eastern neighbor with competitive advantages in the world marketplace that could hurt Ukraine considerably.

It is worthwhile to establish some context for these developments. There would likely never have even been an Orange Revolution -- or a Yushchenko presidency -- without the highly charismatic Tymoshenko, who urged Ukrainians into the streets in the wake of last year's corrupted election. It was she who prodded Yushchenko to symbolically swear an oath on the Bible in parliament, the day before the incumbent government's candidate (Yanukovich) was declared winner, thus setting the stage for the popular revolt. Yushchenko's subsequent decision to appoint Tymoshenko -- a potential rival whose own popularity rivaled his own -- as prime minister created a symbolic tableau of unity that enabled Ukrainians to come together behind the formation of a new government. Yet the two politicians were never an ideal match. Tymoshenko, a billionairess known as the "Gas Princess" for the fortune she amassed in that sector, was a populist politician who pushed aggressively for the new government to reverse perhaps "thousands" (her word) of deals made under the previous regime of Leonid Kuchma that sold off major state industrial holdings to insiders at firesale prices. She was also a strong advocate of increased social spending as a means of raising the Ukrainian population's very low standard of living. Yushchenko, by contrast, was a market liberal who believed it best to act conservatively toward "re-privatization," as it was known, in the interests of fostering stability. (It bears mentioning that Western governments, including the United States, have always been cool toward the program of re-privatization. Although all would agree that the original deals were bogus, they also agreed that post-revolution stability was not well-served by the impression that one Ukrainian government could reverse the agreements made by its predecessor. Yushchenko, as well, was cognizant of the signal these actions send to potential foreign investors, who want to be confident in the government's willingness to enforce contracts and protect private property.) Yushchenko's insurance against the political maneuvering of his rival came in the form of Petro "Chocolate King" Poroshenko, a key ally who was himself a billionaire through his success in the confectionary industry. Yushchenko appointed Poroshenko state security chief, a role in which he could serve as a political foil to Tymoshenko, preventing her from amassing too much power in the new government. In Poroshenko, Tymoshenko found not only an ideological opponent -- he, like Yushchenko, is a free-marketer -- but a rival for prime minister, which is the post he had hoped to be awarded in the wake of the Orange Revolution.

This was a toxic mixture, as the ensuing policy and personality

Link · Ukraine

Hurricane Katrina, Act MMCVI...

September 8, 2005 05:47 AM

In which an elite member of Los Angeles's militant al-Trofiwifa Brigade, having eluded the shock troops of the police state, stands before a massive gray building teeming with bureaucrats, and yells at it.

FEMA, have you no decency??

[In Act MMCVII, set the following morning, our insurgent awakens to find that FEMA has transformed into a dewy-eyed princess, who now sits beside her. The princess says her life had been filled with magic and delight, until one day she was abducted by an Arabian horse trainer....]

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Another Flood Victim

September 8, 2005 05:27 AM

HuffPoster Dan Pasternack is driven to hysterics by the sight of...no dead bodies.

FEMA… which in my mind is now pronounced “feeble”… is trying to block the media from showing us images of the bodies of dead Hurricane Katrina victims being collected along the Gulf Coast. The reasons they are citing include sensitivity, common decency and respect for the dead. I will resist the alternating urges to laugh, cry and scream and say just this… If FEMA chief Michael Brown had the first shred of sensitivity, common decency or respect for living humanity, we wouldn’t be counting the dead in the kind of numbers we are now.

Good...shhh...keep whacking the straw man, Dan. That's it...shhh...let it all out...shhh....

Link ·

Can't...resist...cheap shot. Arghh!

September 7, 2005 08:12 PM

Assurances from some quarters that all federal spending is divided between two mason jars marked "Iraq War" and "Urgent Priorities" have unleashed my quarrelsome Inner Scoundrel.

As a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Senator Landrieu is a strong and effective voice for Louisiana.... In addition, she serves on several appropriations subcommittees of great importance to Louisiana, including Agriculture, Labor, Health and Education, and Military Construction. Senator Landrieu is ranking member [senior Democrat] of the District of Columbia Subcommittee and works to be a voice for so many who have no vote in Congress. [Emphasis mine] link

Bully for her! As it happens, the Senator's subcommittee managed to ready a bill for a vote in the full Senate long before Katrina hit. Shall we have a look at the report language?

The Committee recommends $3,000,000 to continue to implement the Anacostia Waterfront Initiative, which is $24,000 below the fiscal year 2005 enacted level and $2,000,000 below the President's budget request. These funds will support the construction of a multi-use hiker and biker trail system along both sides of the Anacostia River in the District of Columbia. This recreational amenity and transportation alternative will help connect neighborhoods and transform the Anacostia River into a great civic center for the city. The Committee understands that the 20-mile interconnected trail network will provide pedestrian and bicycle-friendly access to the shores of the Anacostia River and will serve to connect the regional trail system in Maryland to the National Mall. With alternative corridors and loops to choose from, users of the trail will find a variety of experiences and connections to other regional and national trails, including Fort Circle Trail, Bladensburg Trail, the East Coast Greenway and the Potomac Heritage Scenic Trail. [Emphasis mine]

So there's $3 million right there that won't go toward building levees in New Orleans -- or to the Iraq War, for that matter. There's more:

The Committee recommends $5,000,000...to implement the Combined Sewer Overflow Program. This is $238,000 more than the amount appropriated in fiscal year 2005. The President requested no funds for this purpose.... Because of its age and capacity contraints, the system discharges sanitary waste and storm-water into the surrounding rivers approximately 60-75 times per year during heavy rains. [Emphasis mine]

Okay, make that $8 million. But of course, we all know about those violent D.C. storms....

Link · American Politics

Choose Carefully

September 7, 2005 05:04 PM

Summoned to the local precinct, Hollywood's scandalized Greek hostess carefully inspects a perp line-up that includes God, President Bush (no relation), Mother Nature and a violent wind force that is looking at the floor, trying not to draw attention.

This is clearly going to be a very long recovery process. And the sooner we've identified those responsible for the Katrina tragedy, the sooner we can make sure they're not around to screw up the recovery.

As the applause slowly die down in the gallery, our heroine breaks character and orders the help to bring in the salad course.

Link ·

The Purse-String's Pockets

September 7, 2005 05:33 AM

In Slate, Hitchens makes an important point that seems to have gotten lost in the debate over the federal government's culpability in the Katrina disaster.

The Constitution is clear on this point: The president doesn't control the purse. An administration cannot spend money that has not been voted. A huge sum of money was voted by Congress, almost unanimously as I recall, for the reconstruction of Iraq. It was felt that we had a national interest in preventing an important state in another Gulf from collapsing into beggary and terror and anarchy. If you want a scandal to investigate, ask yourself why so little of that money has actually yet been spent. But if it had been, or was being, don't delude yourself for one moment that those dollars were stolen from Bourbon Street.

I guess I'd put this more simply: Congressional appropriations is not a particularly enlightened process. (In fact, if it were, computers would probably do a better job of it than elected lawmakers....) In a nutshell, the spending process is controlled by Members of Congress who have been selected by colleagues to set priorities and make decisions about where the money goes. With this comes an enormous amount of power -- including the power to overrule every single spending recommendation made by the president's administration. This is why the military is routinely provided with equipment it says it doesn't need (while being denied equipment it wants), and why rural West Virginia has pristine highways no one uses. You can bet that while New Orleans has been denied money it has needed for the levees, most every half-baked plan that could be devised by Alaska or West Virginia -- homes to former approps chair Ted Stevens and the committee's top Democrat, Robert Byrd, respectively -- has been getting the funding it's needed.

Which brings up another significant point, I think. If Lousiana Senator Mary Landrieu, who sits on the Appropriations Committee, couldn't make her case to these chumps -- even as she remains one of the Democratic Party's most vulnerable incumbents -- that's her problem, not the administration's. Maybe she ought to punch herself.

Link · American Politics

Great Minds Think Alike -- Sort of

September 4, 2005 07:16 AM

Noted levee construction expert Sidney Blumenthal brings his substantial expertise to the debate over Hurricane Katrina, applying a few deft edits to the work of journalist Will Bunch -- beginning with the byline.

When flooding from a massive rainstorm in May 1995 killed six people, Congress authorized the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project, or SELA. Over the next 10 years, the Army Corps of Engineers, tasked with carrying out SELA, spent $430 million on shoring up levees and building pumping stations, with $50 million in local aid. But at least $250 million in crucial projects remained, even as hurricane activity in the Atlantic Basin increased dramatically and the levees surrounding New Orleans continued to subside. -- Bunch, Editor & Publisher magazine 8/31 "Did New Orleans Catastrophe Have to Happen? 'Times-Picayune' Had Repeatedly Raised Federal Spending Issues"

After a flood killed six people in 1995, the Congress created the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project. Operated by the corps of engineers, levees and pumping stations were strengthened and renovated. [During the Clinton administration, natch.] In 2001, when George Bush became president, the Federal Emergency Management Agency issued a report stating that a hurricane striking New Orleans was one of the three most likely potential disasters - after a terrorist attack on New York City. -- Blumenthal, Guardian of London 9/2 "Katrina comes home to roost: President Bush is to blame for the scale of the disaster as a result of his administration's policies and actions"

Yet after 2003, the flow of federal dollars toward SELA dropped to a trickle. The Corps never tried to hide the fact that the spending pressures of the war in Iraq, as well as homeland security -- coming at the same time as federal tax cuts -- was the reason for the strain. At least nine articles in the Times-Picayune from 2004 and 2005 specifically cite the cost of Iraq as a reason for the lack of hurricane- and flood-control dollars. -- Bunch 8/31

But by 2003 the federal funding essentially dried up as it was drained into the Iraq war. -- Blumenthal 9/2

Newhouse News Service, in an article posted late Tuesday night at The Times-Picayune Web site, reported: "No one can say they didn't see it coming. ... Now in the wake of one of the worst storms ever, serious questions are being asked about the lack of preparation." -- Bunch 8/31

The New Orleans Times-Picayune, which before the hurricane published a series on the federal funding problem - whose presses are underwater and can now only put out an online edition - has reported: "No one can say they didn't see it coming ... Now in the wake of one of the worst storms ever, serious questions are being asked about the lack of preparation." -- Blumenthal 9/2

In early 2004, as the cost of the conflict in Iraq soared, President Bush proposed spending less than 20 percent of what the Corps said was needed for Lake Pontchartrain, according to a Feb. 16, 2004, article, in New Orleans CityBusiness. -- Bunch 8/31

By 2004, the Bush administration cut the corps of engineers' request for holding back the waters of Lake Pontchartrain by more than 80%. -- Blumenthal

"That second study would take about four years to complete and would cost about $4 million, said Army Corps of Engineers project manager Al Naomi. About $300,000 in federal money was proposed for the 2005 fiscal-year budget, and the state had agreed to match that amount. But the cost of the Iraq war forced the Bush administration to order the New Orleans district office not to begin any new studies, and the 2005 budget no longer includes the needed money, he said." -- Bunch 8/31 (quoting from Times-Picayune)

A year ago the US army corps of engineers proposed to study how New Orleans could be protected from a catastrophic hurricane, but the Bush administration ordered that the research not be undertaken. -- Blumenthal 9/2

The Senate was seeking to restore some of the SELA funding cuts for 2006. But now it's too late. -- Bunch 8/31

The Senate debated adding funds for fixing levees, but it was too late. -- Blumenthal 9/2

Link ·

September 3, 2005 09:48 AM

Yes, we all do what we can. The NYT's humble readership pitches in to help with the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina -- by generating a meta-bazaar of talking points for the political opportunist. Here are the paper's five most-emailed articles for the previous 24 hours (as of 9:30 a.m. Saturday 9/3).

Paul Krugman: A Can't-Do Government

Maureen Dowd: United States of Shame

The Victims: From Margins of Society to Center of the Tragedy

Editorial: Waiting for a Leader

Editorial: The Man-Made Disaster

One hopes that homeowners along the Gulf Coast had the foresight to purchase Act of Bush policies before the disaster struck.

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